We already know it's a Tivo and that it's a series 2, what we don't know and what smithken31100 was asking was for more specific information regarding whether it's a directv Tivo or a stand alone tivo. The model number, if nothing else, would be very helpful to anyone that may be in a position to help you.

__________________discipuli nostrum bardissimi sunt.
- Assuming based on evidence is not the same as knowing.
- If you want to argue with me at least use some actual facts instead of making it up.

We already know it's a Tivo and that it's a series 2, what we don't know and what smithken31100 was asking was for more specific information regarding whether it's a directv Tivo or a stand alone tivo. The model number, if nothing else, would be very helpful to anyone that may be in a position to help you.

A "stand alone" TiVo TCD 240080.

Sorry for being vague. I've posted here twice. A novice. Any need to be mean ?

Sorry for being vague. I've posted here twice. A novice. Any need to be mean ?

We aren't being mean, we're trying to be specific enough about the specifics we need from you to get the information we need in order to be able to be of help in your specific situation.

My answer(s) will contain info that you may already know so as to be helpful to other readers in the future, as well as, I hope, stuff you don't know yet that will be helpful to you.

That Dynex TV probably has a "composite" video input (the yellow RCA jack/plug), so you could feed that from the 240, along with the white and red for left and right channel audio.

If it has an S-Video input, that might get you a slightly better picture out of the 240's S-Video output.

The 240 does not have component (red, green, and blue jacks) outputs, nor does it have an HDMI output.

It can output something that pretends to be an analog cable/OTA channel 3 or 4 RF signal, though you likely won't need that.

Buried in the settings menu, the 240 offers an aspect ratio choice on the video output of the standard 4:3 or widescreen 16:9 that may help make it look better on the Dynex.

The trick will be getting programs onto the 240.

It's designed for analog over the air (which they don't do any more) and/or analog cable with no cable box involved, and/or being fed by a cable box and/or satellite receiver (of the doesn't have its own hard drive or other recording ability inside variety).

Someone else should be able to chime in and advise if it can get Over The Air digital video by being fed by a "coupon box", and if it can change channels on that box the way it can on cable boxes and satellite receivers.

And it's all in Standard Definition.

I can't tell for sure if you're saying that you're already feeding this TiVo from a sat box other than the main one in the living room, or if somehow the output from the living room sat receiver is being sent to the spare room somehow as well as to the living room TV, or if you're looking to replace a second sat receiver in the spare room with the TiVo.

The term "mirroring", at this stage, provides more confusion to me than enlightenment.

We aren't being mean, we're trying to be specific enough about the specifics we need from you to get the information we need in order to be able to be of help in your specific situation.

My answer(s) will contain info that you may already know so as to be helpful to other readers in the future, as well as, I hope, stuff you don't know yet that will be helpful to you.

That Dynex TV probably has a "composite" video input (the yellow RCA jack/plug), so you could feed that from the 240, along with the white and red for left and right channel audio.

If it has an S-Video input, that might get you a slightly better picture out of the 240's S-Video output.

The 240 does not have component (red, green, and blue jacks) outputs, nor does it have an HDMI output.

It can output something that pretends to be an analog cable/OTA channel 3 or 4 RF signal, though you likely won't need that.

Buried in the settings menu, the 240 offers an aspect ratio choice on the video output of the standard 4:3 or widescreen 16:9 that may help make it look better on the Dynex.

The term "mirroring", at this stage, provides more confusion to me than enlightenment.

We really do want to help, so work with us.

I was getting charged a fee for the Direct TV receiver in the spare room. What I *want* to do, is get rid of the Direct TV receiver and hook the TiVo up to the telly, and a VCR. That way, I can still transfer recordings from the living room TiVo to the spare room TiVo.

I am assuming that I would still need some kind of "receiver" though ?

I am assuming that I would still need some kind of "receiver" though ?

If I am still being muddy, please let me know.

Thanks.

That depends on what you intend to accomplish with the Tivo.
When you want advice it really helps to tell people what you expect up front rather than making them pry everything out of you one little bit at a time.

__________________discipuli nostrum bardissimi sunt.
- Assuming based on evidence is not the same as knowing.
- If you want to argue with me at least use some actual facts instead of making it up.

I was getting charged a fee for the Direct TV receiver in the spare room. What I *want* to do, is get rid of the Direct TV receiver and hook the TiVo up to the telly, and a VCR. That way, I can still transfer recordings from the living room TiVo to the spare room TiVo.

I am assuming that I would still need some kind of "receiver" though ?

If I am still being muddy, please let me know.

Thanks.

ok, so you want to just use the standalone series 2 TiVo with no input source and just use MRV to pull shows from another Series 2 TiVo in another room over your home network.

First, make sure you have no season passes set on this DVR and that you have suggestions also turned OFF. With no input signal it would just record nothing and/or produce unwanted error messages. You may also want to repeat guided setup and change from DTV to something like your local over the air stations so that you aren't pulling down lots of guide information you will never need or use in your daily connections. You will still pull down some, but in this case I think less is better.

The unit will need to remain subscribed of course, but once you do these things it should work for what you want.

Note, if the source TiVo is not a series 2, but is instead a Series 3, TiVo HD, Premiere or Roamio unit then you need to be aware that only standard definition recordings can be transferred. Anything recorded in HD on one of these devices simply cannot be transferred to this old TiVo at all.

ok, so you want to just use the standalone series 2 TiVo with no input source

That's questionable because he asked about needing a "receiver" by which I'm assuming he's referring to an input source. But, is he asking because he wants to also record on the Tivo or because he thinks the Tivo requires an input source to even function?

__________________discipuli nostrum bardissimi sunt.
- Assuming based on evidence is not the same as knowing.
- If you want to argue with me at least use some actual facts instead of making it up.

I am about to knock Direct TV on the head, but only in the spare room.

At the moment, I am charged an extra $10 by Direct TV, for "mirroring" the signal that I get on the Direct TV receiver in the living room.

I now have a series 2 TiVo in the spare room, and I want to connect it to the
HDTV, which is a cheap Dynex model.

Will this be workable ?

I don't care that the series 2 will not record in HD.

Something that might make the whole discussion moot is that the standard definition signal connected to a HDTV might be irritating enough that on one will want to watch it. I can't say from experience, but have read and been told by others that the best signal a Series 2 can put out isn't something anyone would want to watch on a HDTV. Others with personal experience need to chime in if this is true. Or maybe the original poster of this thread has already found that the low quality signal is good enough for them.

Note, if the source TiVo is not a series 2, but is instead a Series 3, TiVo HD, Premiere or Roamio unit then you need to be aware that only standard definition recordings can be transferred. Anything recorded in HD on one of these devices simply cannot be transferred to this old TiVo at all.

He's using DirecTV, so I'm assuming he has another SA TiVo 2 being fed by a DTV receiver. Otherwise, the entire discussion is moot.

I was getting charged a fee for the Direct TV receiver in the spare room. What I *want* to do, is get rid of the Direct TV receiver and hook the TiVo up to the telly, and a VCR. That way, I can still transfer recordings from the living room TiVo to the spare room TiVo.

I am assuming that I would still need some kind of "receiver" though ?

If I am still being muddy, please let me know.

Thanks.

You want to put a Series 2 stand-alone (that means it doesn't have a built-in satellite receiver) TiVo, model TCD240080, in the spare room.

What kind of Digital Video Recorder do you have in the living room?

I assume it's some sort of TiVo, but whether it's a "DirecTiVo" or a stand alone may very well influence where we go from here.

Also, does that TCD240080 have Product Lifetime Service (a lifetime--of the unit itself--subscription to the TiVo service), or are you paying a monthly fee for it to use the TiVo Service?

Something that might make the whole discussion moot is that the standard definition signal connected to a HDTV might be irritating enough that on one will want to watch it. I can't say from experience, but have read and been told by others that the best signal a Series 2 can put out isn't something anyone would want to watch on a HDTV. Others with personal experience need to chime in if this is true. Or maybe the original poster of this thread has already found that the low quality signal is good enough for them.

If you use composite video it will look awful on a HDTV, and most of them don't have s-video inputs these days. I still have four S2s with DirecTV receivers, and I ended up using s-video to feed them through a Toshiba DVD recorder that upscales to 1080p.

The result isn't too bad on my 55" LG. It's letter and pillar boxed, but if you don't try to zoom it and adjust the video settings carefully it's watchable.

Something that might make the whole discussion moot is that the standard definition signal connected to a HDTV might be irritating enough that on one will want to watch it. I can't say from experience, but have read and been told by others that the best signal a Series 2 can put out isn't something anyone would want to watch on a HDTV. Others with personal experience need to chime in if this is true. Or maybe the original poster of this thread has already found that the low quality signal is good enough for them.

I agree with you for the most part, but using the right S2 can make a big difference. I had a DVD burner Series 2 Humax TiVo attached to an HDTV using the RGB outputs and anything recorded in best (720x480) actually looked okay. It wasn't high definition, but it was not objectionably bad.

My biggest generic complaint about feeding an HDTV with an SDTV signal is that many TVs default to a mode where they stretch it wide and then add black bars at the top and bottom making it wider still. For those sets, I would have to go into the menus and switch it to crop mode manually every time the TV sets were turned on. Luckily my Pioneer didn't have that problem and the S2 always came up in the right zoom mode. My paren't Sony was the worst offender in this respect, it didn't even offer a crop mode.